Bite-Sized: Gang's All Here
by that-treason
Summary: A collection of drabbles, ficlets, and sketches - little stories about the ensemble cast, with less focus on romance and more on character. They all started life as prompted writing exercises - bright ideas, but nothing I've slaved over, so quality may vary on these. Nothing goes above Teen rating.


_**Prompt:** "TVD + Caroline/Elena/Bonnie + "we help the helpless" or the AU where the girls realize college is for booze and ditching classes and start running a supernatural detective agency out of their apartment/dorm."_

_A rough little ficlet originally written for the I Haven't Prompted This Before Comment!Ficathon on Upupa-Epops' livejournal._

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It's the hat that gets them going.

Caroline sees the fedora, lying limp on a rack in a thrift shop window, and stops stock still on the sidewalk, THE IDEA flashing through her brain, like lightning from the sky: Mystic Investigations - We Help the Helpless, How Can We Help You?

So really it's all the fault of the hat in the thrift shop window - and Caroline's secret love of _film noir_.

Because Caroline gets bored easily. Caroline always needs a plan - something to organize or fight for or build. School is never challenge enough, not even when they move on to college. Dance committees and event coordination and student government all seem pale shadows of their former glory - none of them serve to scratch the itch properly anymore.

So Caroline's been on the prowl for a greater purpose for a while now, eyes peeled and searching, while in the background Bonnie and Elena hold their collective breath, waiting to be dragged along. It's only a matter of time before _something_ catches her attention.

So when THE IDEA gets under Caroline's skin - that sunny afternoon downtown from campus - they figure it's not worth it to try and dissuade her.

She puts it to them all in a rush, the words flowing from her mouth a million manic miles a minute, tumbling direct from her overexcited brain. Obviously Caroline will be the Brains of the operation - the schemer, the snooper, quick with clues and a fist. Elena will be the Charmer - ready to purr and pout her way to vital information, no slouch at taking care of herself in a scrape. And Bonnie already is their Firepower, their Heavy, their Fixer - magic to solve problems and save lives, common sense and sarcasm enough to keep them all in check.

Caroline's irrepressible joy sweeps them along, even though it's probably the weirdest project she's ever cajoled them into helping with.

They retrofit their apartment into a makeshift office. A big desk moved to the middle of the tiny kitchen common room with the couch turned to face it, ready to hold sobbing dames and nervous joes. The message board on the door carefully stenciled with their hours and contact information. Maps and charts on the walls, eventually joined by thank you letters and pictures of the happy helped.

Advertising starts with flyers, but word of mouth makes that unnecessary within a few weeks. They are good at this weird little service of theirs, so soon enough they can pick and choose the cases they accept.

There's a rhythm that develops between the three of them while they work. When a new client walks through their door, Elena takes notes and Bonnie asks questions, while Caroline sits there cool and collected, feet up on the desk and the hat tipped down over her face. She listens intently for all the things the client doesn't say.

They help a scared werewolf through her first turn. Catch a professor doing compulsion psych experiments on his students. Stop one rogue witch from taking revenge on a fraternity; stop another from fixing grades for football players. They recover magic family heirlooms stolen from dorm rooms and break the curses on jewelry used by jealous roommates to wreak havoc. Through it all they keep tons of drunk kids from becoming vampire snacks. Even manage to rescue a puppy along the way.

They drink too much booze and they argue long and loud, almost every night.

Sometimes they get into trouble, or make new enemies, or burn bridges.

But mostly, they make money and friends and fight the good fight.

They help the helpless, like others helped them.

And pretty much inevitably, they fail out of school by the end of fall semester.

But Caroline still loves running her fingers along that soft fedora brim - loves tipping it back above her curls, and tugging it down to hide her eyes.

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_A/N: I know I should be working on Low Road, but I needed a little brain cleanser in the middle so when I came across this prompt I spent a bit of time with it. I didn't polish it to a crazy degree and the language isn't 100% what I want - but mostly I wanted to get the idea out of my head onto the screen. Now back to slaving over more philosophical vampire stuff._


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